Giving Thanks to the Trees

Many people, other than the authors, contribute to the making of a book, from the first person who had the bright idea of alphabetic writing through the invention of the movable type to the lumberjack who felled the trees that were pulped for printing. It is not customary to acknowledge the trees themselves, though their commitment is total.
~ Rada and Forsyth, Machine Learning

When I examine my bookshelves for the perfect book to read, I am always thankful for my books. I’ve never thought to be thankful for the trees, too.


La Conquistadora

La Conquistadora

Chapel of La Conquistadora © 2008  Bo Mackison

The Chapel of La Conquistadora adjoins the large Basilica Cathedral of St. Francis of  Assisi near the Old Square in Santa Fe, New Mexico.  The Chapel, built in 1714, houses La Conquistadora, the oldest Madonna in the United States.

The statue, carved of wood, was brought to the area by Franciscan Friars in 1625.

Mysterious Scandinavian Carvings

Scandinavian Wood Carving

Scandinavian Wood Carving © 2008 Bo Mackison

I have admired these wood carvings since I first visited Sister Bay, a town in Door County in the northeastern part of Wisconsin, more than three decades ago. There are at least six statues I have examined, each maybe 3 or 4 feet in height, each carved and painted and polished. When I first saw them, they looked old. Every time I return, the cracks are a little deeper, but the figures’ eyes still peer with a glimmer of character.

Sister Bay was founded by Scandinavians in the 1850s and has a strong cultural heritage. I have asked many people, the people who live in the towns up and down the Door Peninsula, for information about these traditional carvings. No one seems to have any clue. Obviously, I’m asking the wrong people. Some one must know their history.

Finally, I decided to do a Google search, confident information would turn up. After all, isn’t everything on the Internet. Seems the answer to that is no. I can find nothing. Not a thing. They remain a big mystery.

So I’m hoping that by throwing this out into the Internet universe, someone may stumble on it, and shed some light to these mysterious carvings. They are just way too cool to remain so anonymous.

Brown or Yellow?

You call it!

You call it!

As a first or second grader, I would have been highly concerned that some adult made a serious mistake when painting the sign on the school bus. Surely big people who can spell all those hard words and then paint them on buses know the difference between the colors brown and yellow?

Life is not always as it seems – especially when you are six.

But even when you are a big people, too!

Anything for a Distraction

Don’t Quit Playing

Thanks to Amuirin at Stop and Wander for the meme nomination. I’ll play along, since I haven’t done anything for the last four days, except clean my house in preparation for the soon-to-be Thanksgiving festivities. And I’m a little desperate for any distraction.

(Here are the rules, in case you’ve been in another galaxy for the last decade and don’t know what a meme is: Players start with 7 random facts about themselves. Those tagged should post these rules and then post 7 random facts. Players should tag 7 other people and notify them that they’ve been tagged.)

Hmm. Okay, I can do the random facts part.

1. I’ll start with a Thanksgiving fact. I haven’t hosted Thanksgiving for 30 years. That was the last time I was ever asked to cook the T-day bird. I was a novice in the holiday kitchen then, and left the packet of giblets in the turkey cavity to combine with the undercooked stuffing, and I made the only vegetable casserole I knew how to bake – the (in)famous green bean-mushroom soup-fried onion rings from a can combo. Pathetic.

2. This year I volunteered for the job, figuring everyone had finally forgotten about 1978. They had, and they all accepted the invitation. I know a lot more about cooking for a crowd this time around. A crowd of 16 to be exact. But that doesn’t really matter, because I’m handing chef responsibilities over to my husband.

3. When I was in high school, I marched in a Color Guard. We traveled all over the East and Midwest. When we marched in the Cherry Blossom Parade in DC, we met then President Richard Nixon. (Yeah, he was the prez!) We presented him with a gift – a baseball style cap with the patch of the color guard sewn on it. I did the sewing, and in a moment of anticipated fame, I stuck my personalized card under the patch. Obviously done in the hopes that on a future day I could visit the Presidential Library and admire the cap in person. Obviously, that day will never transpire.

4. I grew up in a four-generation home. Not only did my parents get to tell me what to do, my grandparents and my great-grandmother also got in their two shakes of advice, for whatever it was worth. I was also taught the ways of their worlds. By the time I was 13, I could garden, sew, knit, tat, embroidery, darn a sock, crochet, and pull taffy. I, however, did not learn how to make a Thanksgiving dinner. Unfortunately. (See # 1 if you’ve already forgotten why.)

5. When I was a student living in Chicago, I went to a Led Zeppelin concert. Our tickets were in the third row from the ceiling in Chicago Stadium. That was the night I discovered I have a moderate degree of acrophobia. That’s fear of heights in plain English.

6. I took four years of Latin in high school. I can decline Latin nouns and verbs with ease, but I cannot speak any language other than English. I have since tried taking other language courses, and my brain has thus far refused to master even basic phrases if not written in Latin or English. I deeply regret this.

7. I’m an introvert and don’t pass on tags.

So, no tagging, though if you want to play, feel free. I break chain letters and refuse to follow recipes, too. But I do make a mean green bean casserole.